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Report - Oak Hall, Haslemere aka Wispers School 17/09/09 Report

28DL Full Member

Having been demoted to Junior member (not surprisingly really, I've been lurking for the best part of three years without posting anything) I thought I would put a few reports up. I visited Wispers back in September with Gemma, my lodger who is an ex-pupil; several of my mates' daughters had been educated here and once it was empty I just knew I had to have a nosy around. I have to say, this place blew me away... I'd rather like to move in. I've taken this report straight off one of the other forums which I post on from time to time, if this causes a problem to the mods, just take it down.

The main house at Wispers school was originally known as Oak Hall. The Hall was built in 1910 for the Scottish landscape and portrait painter James Coutts Michie and his wife who had married the previous year.

Oak Hall is a fine imposing house built in the Elizabethan style. It has tall bay windows, large gables and the left wing has battlements. The chimneys are built in groups of four at right angles to each other in the manner of Tudor builders. Essentially it was designed to look like an Elizabethan country house.

Pretty much the last of it's kind, it was considered dated by the time it was built and after the Great War it became increasingly difficult to hire and retain the vast array of servants required to maintain and service such a residence.

In 1925, Mrs Michie left Oak Hall and moved to Cobham. She leased the house to the Misses Voy and Keyte-Perry (haha do you think Miss Keyte-Perry kissed a girl and she liked it!?) The ladies established a successful "school for young ladies" which remained "Oak Hall School" until being purchased by the Wispers Trust in 1969.

Wispers School closed suddenly in 2008 amid allegations of the governors and staff lining their own pockets by the sale of the property. Nonetheless, the credit crunch has, at least for the meantime, put paid to the relentless spread of "luxury appartements".